Little By Little
by TheVelvetDusk
Summary: "She's not a dream. He didn't make her up. She's home." (lyatt bunker fic, post 2x01 episode tag)


_a/n: HYPERVENTILATING OVER LAST NIGHT'S EP. AHHHH._

 _(it's funny to me that 99% of all hiatus fics are officially out the window now that all the characters live in a bunker and Mason Industries got leveled to the ground, but hey, that just means endless bunker!fics to fill the new void of canon-relevant fics, right?!)_

 _I wrote most of this last week based on sneak peeks/promos etc., then waited to edit/post until I could actually watch 2x01 and clean up the details. So yeah. This is pretty much an episode tag that picks up during the lyatt comfort scene in the bunker (ahhh!) and moves on from there._

* * *

" _I've lost everything."_

" _You haven't lost me."_

It doesn't take long for Wyatt to realize that he can't heal the depths of her hurt with one simple embrace. He knows what it feels like to experience a pain so crushing that the foundation of everything you think you know - of the world, of yourself - comes crumbling down around you in jagged, indiscernible pieces. He commits himself to putting her back together little by little. It could be hours, days, weeks, months, or goddamn years; he won't give up until she's standing strong again.

And if it takes years...well, he's pretty sure he wants _years_ with her anyhow. Good years, bad years, happy years, maybe even grow-old-together years…

Lucy sniffles against his shoulder, shaking him from a runaway train of his imagination. He's insane to even begin down that path when they're hiding out in a stark fallout shelter and she's falling apart in his arms, so he's silencing that ridiculous fantasy for now, tucking it away until he can examine it properly and determine if he's lost his damn mind for ever considering another shot at something he's permanently sworn off - _love_.

But really, he knows it's not insane or ridiculous. There's a reason he wasn't able to formulate a proper sentence after Rufus dropped that word on him in 1918. He also knows that no amount of denial can compete with the increasingly uncontrollable swell in his heart whenever she's within reach. He can remind himself all he wants that he'd long ago chosen to seal himself off from the probability of finding love a second time, but it's useless to think he could have sealed himself off from _Lucy_. That's the difference; he didn't ever make a conscious choice to open his heart to her, she just wouldn't take no for an answer.

Her tears don't seem to be slowing down, and he isn't satisfied to sit awkwardly at her side with her head turned halfway into his neck. It doesn't seem to be enough for her. It's definitely not enough for him.

Wyatt begins to pull away as her hand drifts over his neck, caresses his jaw, and draws her thumb downward in a staggeringly intimate arc against his cheek. Her breath scatters warmly over his mouth as he turns toward her and he's at war with himself. Just the slightest tilt of his head and they'll be kissing. He wants it. He wants it so damn bad that he thinks there's a few neurons in his brain going haywire at the prospect. Her body language all but screams out for him to lean in and let his mouth fall against hers. It would be so easy, so simple, so completely justifiable. She needs comfort and he's desperate to be the one who gives it to her.

But everything he's feeling is all mixed up in the trembling fear that's telegraphed plainly across her face and throughout her body. He feels the moisture of her tears lingering on his skin from where she's been crying into his neck. Her fingers press into him with a touch that's urgent, searching, frantic. She's still processing the fact that he's here, that he _exists_ , that he's not dead. Yes, he absolutely wants to kiss her, but more than that, he wants her to know that his presence in her life isn't tied to a temporary patch of physical affection. He's in this for the long haul and he's not sure that tonight is the night to let a kiss do all the talking.

He blinks down at Lucy's mouth with plummeting restraint and repositions his hand across her shoulders, still swept up in that thinly distinguishable space between tempting himself with what will surely be heaven or staying grounded here on earth, when Jiya's voice cuts through his cloud of indecision.

He can't keep his face from falling just a little, but he turns to look at her nonetheless, stuffing down about a thousand incomprehensible emotions as Jiya fumbles through an apology that's stilted with embarrassment. Her visible unease at interrupting whatever the hell had been about to go down has zero impact on Wyatt. He doesn't move to release Lucy, doesn't even attempt to find the self-control to stop his wandering hands from skimming over her arm, her shoulders, her back. He needs to touch her, needs to stay connected to her for as long as possible, needs to make up for six damn weeks of unendurable separation and he doesn't care who knows it.

As much as he wants to fight against it, with Jiya's cryptic request comes an inevitable loss of contact between them. Lucy lags a couple steps behind him as they join the others, and Wyatt can't help but glance back at her every few seconds to confirm that she's still there, a new habit that he may never be able to break himself of after everything they've been through together.

And as brick after brick of bad news begins to drop around them, his concern for her becomes so much more amplified. This isn't some big ugly enemy who's out there randomly devouring history and creating havoc; this is her mom. Her _mom_. Lucy has obviously been a plant from the start without even knowing it, and now it's clear to him that she will never ever escape this...no matter what happens, no matter how valiantly they fight, she is going to live with the curse of this inheritance for the rest of her life. Not even he can shelter her from that.

He keeps one eye on her as the team begins to rifle through each of Nicholas's letters, and when her eyebrows begin to draw inward and her breathing gets a little shallow, he decides to take it a step further and keep a hand on her too. She pushes through the moment and makes an impressive effort at staying sharp and contributing to their strategy session, but Wyatt watches like a hawk for warning signs of an impending crash.

Rufus is reading line after line of insanity off of that damn cell phone when Lucy begins to wobble a bit on her feet. Her hand shoots out to grip the tabletop for stability, and she tries to shrug it off when she feels everyone's eyes on her, but her offhand smile is hauntingly weak. Wyatt says her name softly but gets no reply. He cements an arm around her shoulders and she sags into him with a tremor so slight that it's almost invisible.

Wyatt casts a hard glance over to Agent Christopher, and she grants him a margin of a nod in response.

"Let's break for the night," she says with unflinching authority. "We can start with fresh eyes tomorrow."

Lucy stands a little straighter, her voice coming out too gravelly to be convincing, but she forces her way through a halfhearted protest anyhow. "No, I'm okay, we should - "

"That's an order, Lucy. Get some rest and we'll regroup in the morning."

She doesn't say another word, not even as Wyatt ushers her back to the bed that he's been mentally reserving for her since day one of this pitiful foxhole existence. He takes quick stock of what she's wearing and decides it looks comfortable enough to pass as sleepwear. There's a split second of indecision inside of him, because for all of the millions of times he's imagined bringing her back to safety, he's never once allowed himself to envision this exact moment… the one where she's actually going to share this tiny trench of a room with him.

He takes a minuscule step away from her bed, but her fingers lock around his hand in an jarringly tense grip as she peers up at him with eyes that are submerged in unshed tears.

"Wyatt, don't…don't…"

She never quite manages to say the word 'go' but he gets the message nonetheless.

"I'm here, Lucy," he whispers roughly as he drops down next to her, "I'm right here, and I'm _staying_ right here. You have me. I promise that won't change."

And because he's powerless to stop himself from giving in to some small indulgence of what they're both quite obviously craving, he tangles his fingers into her rumpled dark hair and tips her head down until he can press a kiss against her forehead. Something twists inside of his heart like a muscle that's gone unused for too many years, a bittersweet ache that tells him this kiss to the forehead is just the beginning.

The levee breaks then and fresh tears stream over her cheeks as the facade shatters. Wyatt guides her down along the thin mattress with him, never once relinquishing his hold on her slight frame. The bunker shrinks down to nothing but her and the shivering grief that's spilling out of her. He curls himself around her like a protective shell, nestling her carefully between his body and the wall, unable to find a reason to talk himself out of it when she's shaking so severely, weeping so openly, splitting open into pieces before him.

They've spent so many long, painful nights apart from each other. He's suffered through too many nights lying wide awake in this same room, wondering if she was still out there, if she's okay, if she's hanging on...if she's been waiting for him to come flying in on an all guns blazing rescue mission, only to be disappointed when she wakes up alone to the same living hell again and again. He's sat up from dusk till dawn night after night, asking himself if she's given up on him entirely, if she's resigned herself to the fact that maybe he's failed her, that maybe this time he's forsaken her altogether.

And only then, when he'd been too deeply entrenched in his hopelessness to shut out the worst possible outcome, he'd questioned if she was even alive...never aloud, never in front of the others, but that paralyzing doubt had wormed its way inside of him even if he refused to admit it to anyone. He couldn't afford to dwell on it, because it had the power to wreck him beyond repair.

But she's here now and she's unraveling like a spool of yarn in a hurricane. He's finally coming back together after feeling like his heart has been scattered to the four corners of the earth, and thank God for that, because this is the only reason he's been keeping his head above water. _She_ is the only reason. And she's alive, she's safe, she's in his arms, but she's not okay… not really. There isn't a lot he can do to fix so much of what's broken, but he can remind her that there's still one thing she has left to hold onto - she doesn't have to believe the lie that he and Rufus are lost to her forever.

Wyatt tucks her head under his chin and finds himself repeating the same words over and over again. "You have me, Lucy. You still have me."

Her face presses against him as she's consumed with another harrowing sob. He stares at the wall behind her through a veil of his own tears and remembers - remembers how long its been since he last saw her smile - _really_ smile, without any complications, without a shadow of distress or confusion or melancholy. He remembers what it was like the last time they found themselves sharing a narrow bed like this one in Bonnie and Clyde's rundown cabin, remembers the awkwardness of their shuffling arms, contending for a shred of personal space without…without doing _this_ , without arranging himself around her and cuddling her closer until their limbs are irreversibly knotted together as one.

His mind roams further still, remembering what it's like to wake up to the comfort of a warm, soft body… to wake up with a woman in his bed _at all_ , let alone a woman who owns his whole heart. And for the first time in years, he can't help but believe that he'll be reliving that experience in the very near future.

But he's not getting so far ahead of himself just yet. Wyatt tells himself that he'll only stay in her bed until she makes it clear that she wants him to leave it. To his surprise, that moment doesn't come until he's unexpectedly blinking against the thin light of a new morning and Lucy is no longer there with him. He glances to and fro with a furrowed brow, taken aback by the realization that he's slept through an entire night without disruption, no nightmares, no insomnia. That takes a rapid backseat as his pulse races furiously for a few horrible seconds while he considers the possibility that she's not actually here, that she's _never_ been here, that everything he remembers from yesterday is nothing more than a vivid dream, a desperate projection of his greatest wish…

But he's in the wrong bed. He never sleeps in this one. And the pillow is fragrant with a familiar scent that he knows to be hers. There's a dark smudge blotted across the center of his t-shirt that looks suspiciously like drool.

She's not a dream. He didn't make her up. She's home.

A spray of water echoes out into the hallway as Wyatt passes the showers. He almost calls out to her just to assure himself that she's alright in there, but then his mind slides away from him and he's suddenly picturing the full expanse of Lucy's pale skin shrouded in nothing but vaporous steam, and now he can hardly swallow, let alone speak.

He flees to the makeshift weight room and puts himself through a punishing round of circuits, not stopping until his muscles ache and his brain is numb with exhaustion. It's only then that he trusts himself to play the part of a respectful teammate, a caring friend, a...well, anything other than a damn dog in heat.

* * *

He hesitates that night.

The idea of her isn't just an idea anymore. She's here, she's real, and she spends most of the day sticking close by his side. He gets to watch her dark hair slowly air dry from her morning shower, gradually springing into soft little waves around her face as the morning passes. She picks at some food while she studies the pages of printouts that are scattered about the center of the Silo. She finds a pen and starts to jot down some notes, referencing and cross-referencing with renewed diligence. Wyatt tries to assist as much as he can, but mostly he's just absorbing everything he's been deprived of since the explosion, cataloging every little detail of her face, her hands, her voice. He's sure that she isn't aware of the way her tongue peeks out to one side when she's concentrating, and that's probably the cutest unconscious habit he's ever seen.

Well, the cutest, and also the most distracting if he lets himself think about it too much. And then _cute_ isn't the word on his mind anymore.

But her energy flags on and off for the rest of the day. She seems content to simply sit back and observe everyone else's conversations as the hours wear on, and then she's the first one to turn in once the sun has gone down on what feels like the shortest day of Wyatt's life.

The pull to follow her to bed is strong, so strong that he's balling up his hands into fists as he watches her escape from the common area, but she doesn't steal even the smallest glance behind her as she goes, so Wyatt assumes she wants to be alone. He holds himself back from going to check on her for as long as he can handle it, and then the pressure in his chest finally loosens when he caves in and lets his legs carry him to the only place he wants to be. He sits down on the bed across from hers, watching the even rise and fall of her body as she sleeps soundly.

She's beautiful. Even in clothes that are too big for her, when she's dangerously pale and the skin around her eyes is too dark in contrast...she's still so beautiful. He's made the mistake of trying to ignore it before, but he's never succeeded in convincing himself that he doesn't notice. He's _always_ noticed. He's even let her know it a few times if she'd been paying any attention to the way he looks at her when he's too stricken with attraction to hide it.

Wyatt falls asleep just moments after he's collapsed against his mattress, experiencing an immense sense of peace in the fact that he's simply existing in the same room as Lucy, inexplicably content to be breathing the same air as her for the second night in a row. It's more than enough to soothe his frayed nerves for another spell of profoundly dreamless sleep.

But her night isn't as dreamless.

He wakes to a gentle dip and shift next to him, opening his grainy eyes to just barely make out the backlit outline of Lucy slipping beneath his covers in the darkness.

"Hey," he murmurs thickly. "Are you - "

He notices a glistening hint of tear tracks on her face an instant before she crowds her way into his chest without a word of explanation, so he skips over the rest of his question and just gathers her against him with open arms.

Several minutes pass before she speaks. Her fingers twist his shirt into her fist as she mumbles solemnly into the otherwise still night. "You were dead. I found you in the explosion and you were dead, just like she told me."

He kisses the top of her head and keeps himself there, nose buried in her hair as he fights off a few tears of his own. "It wasn't real, Lucy. Just a dream. I'm here."

"It was in the newspaper, you know. She brought it to me, in real life. My...my mom had to show me the article in the paper because I - I refused to believe it."

Heaven help them all if he ever has another chance at a come-to-Jesus meeting with Carol Preston, because he genuinely fears the fire inside of him that kindles so intently against her. Emma poses no question - he has the shot, he'll take the shot. But Lucy's mom...that presents a far more complex dilemma, one that he rationally knows would be far better off in anyone's hands but his own.

But irrationally? He'd gladly gun her down in the streets if that's what it takes to extract his revenge.

"We should have gotten to you sooner," he answers with barely bridled frustration. "You never should have had to believe any of it, not even for a second."

"All that matters is that it wasn't true," she says with a sniffle. She inhales slowly and lets out a big breath against his neck, squirming a little until she finds a comfortable spot against him. "Is it...can I... - "

"Anything, Lucy. Just ask."

"Is it alright if I stay here a little longer?"

"As long as you want," he agrees with a soft smile.

She nods, and he feels the remaining shackles of tension flooding out of her body as she takes a few more measured breaths against him.

He wonders if she's aware that his invitation extends far beyond this exact moment, this night, this bunker, this shitty mission. The magnitude of what he feels for her is starting to appear blisteringly obvious to him, but her world is in ruins right now, and he understands all too well how that can really screw with your perception of everything and everyone around you.

It's okay. He can be patient. Truthfully, as long as she's safe - as long as she's _here_ \- his patience knows no limits.

She whispers a muffled, "thank you," on the wings of a sleepy sigh as her head shifts into place against his shoulder.

"Whatever you need, Lucy," he assures her with his full heart rising into his throat. "Whatever you need."

* * *

She's still sleeping when Wyatt stirs against her the next morning.

All he has to do is catch a glimpse of her snuggled up against him and his heart expands with the unmistakable wish that this moment is the product of some wildly different circumstances. Why couldn't they be on a happy little vacation, waking up to a world that's sunny and warm and safe? What would it be like if they were able to just lounge around late into the morning, waiting for room service to deliver a tray of breakfast to be shared in bed, if their only cause for exhaustion was an endless night of dizzying lovemaking, if there was nothing but skin hidden beneath these sheets, if -

"Hi," she says quietly, breaking him from his deluded reverie.

"Hey." He grunts once, smothering out that last trace of wanton desire before it can take hold of his anatomy in a way that won't escape her attention. "Sleep okay?"

Lucy nods lazily with her dark eyes fluttering at half mast. He can tell she's still not quite awake by the unruffled hush that warms her expression, a fleeting serenity that's preserving her against the harshness of everything she's been through. Wyatt slants his head down and kisses her forehead while he can still get away with it, grateful to witness even the slightest reprieve in the midst of so much sadness.

Her mouth flickers up at the corners and his pulse thunders in response. Suddenly his daydream doesn't feel so far away. Maybe this is the day to tell her where his head's been at, to confess that he'd been an unhinged wreck every day that she was missing... To admit that when Rufus had been ready to hire an airplane to write _Wyatt loves Lucy_ across the sky, Wyatt couldn't bring himself to put any real effort to his protest. In fact, he's not even fighting against the assumption anymore, so -

But that's when her gaze lifts and she's glancing beyond him to examine their surroundings. Same gritty bunker. Same gritty life.

He watches with a pit of despair growing in his stomach as the sleepy haze drains away from her face. She draws herself up with a grimace and rubs a merciless hand over her red-rimmed eyes.

Wyatt touches her arm on a reflex, but there's no easing the hellish burden she carries now. He scrambles for a scrap of normalcy, offering to look for coffee and praying that there's still some morsel of food around here that passes for edible. It's hardly the breakfast he'd been envisioning when he first woke, but by the time he's returning to her, there's a mug of coffee to share, a few oranges, and a poor excuse for toast that lacks butter or jelly or anything else with actual taste involved.

Lucy takes one skeptical look at the plate in his hand and goes straight for the coffee.

"It's black," he warns belatedly as he watches her nose crinkle at the first sip.

"Better than nothing," she answers wearily, gulping down a little more this time. "At least it's hot."

"I'm guessing we have Jiya to thank for that. She usually has the decency to leave a little behind or put another pot on, unlike her scumbag boyfriend who always finishes it off and walks away like he's the only one who drinks it. "

Lucy pauses over the rim of the mug, peering down at the coffee like she's going to find something important there. "I wish I could have been here...the whole time, I mean. It's weird to hear you talk about everyone living together like this while I was - well, not _here_."

He thinks about what a miserable jackass he's been in the weeks that she was missing, considering for an instant how different it would have been if Lucy was with them all along. The bunker is still a bunker, but being stuck here with Lucy is a major upgrade over being stuck here without her.

He feels her eyes on him as he peels the first orange, so he musters a response that lands somewhere in the middle of a half-baked joke and the actual truth. "You haven't missed much. Rufus doesn't like any of my ghost stories. There haven't been any good prank wars. Mason can't cook for shit, there's too many of us for just one stupid bathroom, and Agent Christopher has ignored all of my requests for a community keg. Trust me when I say that you're definitely the best thing that's come along so far."

"Consider me flattered." She grins over the coffee cup and takes one more sip before passing it to him. She scoots back over the bed until her back is propped up against the wall and she closes her eyes. "Rumor has it that a keg isn't the only thing you and Denise argued about."

Wyatt tips the mug back and swallows a big gulp, not at all surprised that either Rufus or Jiya - or probably both of those weasels - wasted no time in informing her of his hot-tempered defiant streak. "Sorry, pleading the fifth on that."

She angles her head sideways to regard him with a suspect smile. "So you don't want to tell me about the time you attempted to melt through a steel door with a confiscated blow torch?"

"You shouldn't believe everything you hear, Lucy," he says with a smirk as he presses an orange slice into her hand. "Now eat some breakfast. I doubt you've choked down more than a few crumbs in the last several weeks, so I'm not taking no for answer."

"They didn't starve me, Wyatt," she retorts with a defensive eye roll.

"I believe you. But I also know what it's like to be on enemy turf. Under the circumstances, I very much doubt that you could stomach more than a few bites of anything they put in front of you."

He decides to leave off the fact that he also thinks her cheekbones are practically jumping off of her face or that she's feels far too small every time he wraps his arms around her. The sassier side of Lucy Preston is finally making an appearance and he's fairly certain that those observations will drive her back into hiding again.

She pops the wedge of fruit into her mouth with a look that can only be described as insubordinate, and God help him, but that face of hers is making him more than a little flustered. Lucy chews it up with a theatrical flare that's damn near Oscar-worthy before arching a challenging brow. "There. Happy?"

"Nope." He waggles his brows back at her and dangles another slice near her mouth. "Have another."

Just as he'd hoped, she tilts forward and snatches it right out of his hand with nothing but her teeth. He can't help but stare blankly as the orange disappears behind her lips. She flushes a little and glances down at her lap, fiddling nervously with the locket that hasn't once left her neck since they've returned to the present. Wyatt wordlessly offers the plate of toast and she takes it eagerly, obviously glad to have something else to occupy herself...something other than obsessing over the fact that she's just eaten right off of his fingertips.

He swallows down more coffee because he needs the diversion just as badly as she does, maybe even more so, because he's heavily considering the slippery impulse that's compelling him to pin her down against the mattress and make those rusty old springs squeak like there's no tomorrow.

But she's nibbling at a slice of toast and reaching for another orange wedge, so he'll table that thought for now. Eating is good. Sex is better, but eating is, well...a more crucial priority at the moment.

Maybe. It's up for debate.

"You should be eating too," she mutters with a poke to his arm. "You look skinnier."

Based on the massive amount of time he's thrown into a series of very angry workouts over the last six weeks, he's fairly certain that she's wrong about the skinny part, but he plays along anyhow. "Thanks, but I prefer the word _chiseled_."

Laughter sparks into her eyes and he's transfixed. " _Wyatt_. Eat some damn toast."

He does as asked with a dash of exaggerated gravity. "Yes, ma'am."

She's laughing with more than just her eyes now. It's a low hum of a chuckle and it sounds like paradise to him. Her thumb fits against the dip of his dimple as she grins widely at him. "I thought we talked about that whole ma'am thing."

He turns his face into her palm and finds her to be much closer than he'd expected. He wants to say something funny, something that will spur another entrancing laugh from her, but his brain isn't cooperating. All he can manage is a soft-eyed smile and a dry swallow that must be loud enough for her to hear.

Lucy's smile fades slowly. "I - I'm sorry that you had to go through this...to be stuck here waiting while - "

"Hey, no, you don't need to - "

"Yes, I do," she exhales as her eyebrows crease together. "It had to be awful, Wyatt, and I know it's not my fault, but that doesn't change the fact that I am so, _so_ sorry that it happened. I know...I know that it couldn't have been easy for you to - to go through that…"

She's omitting one word, that one vital word that drills down to the real reason she's apologizing with such stormy desperation. _Again_. She knows that it couldn't have been easy for him to go through this _again_ , because he's done all of this before. He's gone through the waiting, the not knowing, the devastating helplessness, and at the end of those two weeks, he'd been dealt the one thing that could be worse than all the circling torment that had come before it; Jess was gone and there was nothing left to wait for - or to live for - anymore.

Two weeks of praying for Jess to return had been a hellish eternity. Six gut-wrenching weeks in this bunker had nearly cost him his sanity.

Lucy's thumb slips over his cheek, wiping away a tear that's tumbled free of its own volition. He shudders, closes his eyes and tries to pull himself together, but when she sets the plate aside and folds her arms around his middle, there's no use in pretending. His head drops against hers and he relinquishes his very tight grasp on a spillway of curbed emotion.

He feels disoriented by the sudden flip of a switch inside of him. There's been this unstoppable protective instinct that has yet to subside no matter how long she's been out of harm's way, and that's all muddled up with an immeasurable drive of lust, attachment, magnetism…love. But apparently that's not enough to deal with, because here he is, crying into her hair without an ounce of shame or restraint, allowing himself to come face-to-face with the nightmare he's been living in from the moment that first explosion hit Mason Industries. He almost lost her. He almost forfeited the foreign sense of happiness that she draws out of him. He almost never got the chance to tell her that he's fallen for her, that he's not running away from it, that he accepts these feelings that have descended over him so hard and fast and certain.

She told him once that she's never experienced the lightning bolt, that undeniable sign from the heavens that shouts out with an audible force - _this is it, this is who you're meant to be with, this is the missing piece that brings meaning to everything else around you_. She's never felt it, but he has, and that's why there's no excusing the fact that he hadn't said it better the first time around. It's not a mistake he's willing to make twice.

Wyatt lifts his head, brushes a hand over his face, collecting the tear-stricken residue of his heartache in his hand. There are tears in her eyes too, little silver bursts of compassionate understanding.

He doesn't deserve her, he's sure of it, but that's an irrelevant point since there's no way he's giving her up now.

"Lucy, I...I - "

His words are whipped away as an excited call rings out from the other side of the wall. One animated voice grows into two, then three. Wyatt only catches snippets of what's being said, but it's not hard to piece together the obvious - Rufus and Jiya have pinpointed a location based off of Lucy's work on Keynes's manifesto, the Lifeboat is finally at full charge, and his chance at telling Lucy he loves her is whisked away from him. They're going back in time to root out the first of God only knows how many sleeper cell agents.

Lucy's face is awash with dread, but she hardens her jaw and drags herself to her feet. She's preparing for battle and he's in awe of this person before him, because she sure as hell can't be that same skittish history professor who'd blundered through their first mission with absolutely zero sense of calm or composure.

He stops her before she can get too far. With his hands framing her face, he touches his forehead to hers and makes a silent promise to not waste a single second that they have together from now on. "You and I need to talk when we get back from this one, okay?"

The significance of what hangs between them isn't escaping her wide-eyed gaze as she nods back at him. "Okay."

Wyatt twines their hands together and leads the way toward the Lifeboat's improvised launching pad. He hates that Lucy has to do this, hates that she's becoming this battle-worn person who's learned to compartmentalize far too well in the time they've been separated. He also hates that Rittenhouse has found a way to stack the deck against them, hates that his team has such a large weight bearing down on their shoulders, hates that there's no foreseeable end to this labyrinth of madness. But when they're all ready to go and he's leaning forward across the time machine to very deliberately buckle Lucy in with a smile that can't be stifled, there's at least one thing that he doesn't have to hate anymore - doing any of this without her.

* * *

 _I may have rewatched this ep like 16 times tonight, and now that this story is officially finished, I'm finally free to hit everyone else's stories yayyyy :)_

 _HELLO SEASON 2. I AM LIVING._


End file.
